YMMV / The French Connection

• Aluminium Christmas Trees:
  • Just in case anyone was wondering about that scene where the traffickers are testing the purity of their merchandise... pure substances (such as heroin) have fixed melting points, but the melting point will become lowered if the substance is impure. So, if the powder tastes like heroin and melts at the right temperature (as determined by a Thiele melting point apparatus in this case), then it's got to be pure heroin. The trafficker's expert demonstrates all the salient points of the lab procedure, even displaying the mineral oil bottle just to show us that he's using the usual heat transfer medium. On top of that, real heroin was used for that scene.
  • The entire plot is based on the real "French connection" case where raw Turkish opium was processed into heroin in Marseilles before coming to the US. Many other countries have also served as drug middlemen.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Popeye and Sonny's informant asks "You talkin' to me, baby?" when they stage a bust to get information from him.
• Fridge Horror: William Friedkin has stated that he believes most of the perps getting dismissals or light sentences was due to payoffs and bribes. Who gets thrown under the bus? Devereaux, the TV star and Unwitting Pawn (he knew he was likely getting into criminal activity, but he didn't know how bad it was) who backed out when he realized how much trouble he could be in. Granted, he served "only" four years but it was still in a federal prison. It's a frightening message: you can't get out of a deal with Charnier.
• Magnificent Bastard: Alain Charnier is a debonair heroin peddler who has a Marseille detective murdered for getting too close, but resists doing so with Popeye Doyle in the knowledge that it will only bring more officers. Intending to establish a flood of heroin on the market by smuggling it in an unsuspecting friend's car, Charnier spends the film matching wits with the police only to give them the slip and merrily escape them, ultimately eluding capture and fulfilling his ends. At least until the sequel.
• Narm:
  • Popeye's introductory scene, where, while dressed as Santa Claus, he and Cloudy catch a drug dealer, then proceed to kick the absolute shit out of him.
    "Now, I'm gonna bust your ass for those three bags, and I'm gonna nail you for picking your feet in Poughkeepsie!"
  • The search for the drugs in the car. As car buff Jonathan Banks pointed out after doing a Shout-Out to the scene in Better Call Saul, the rocker panels are one of the most obvious places to stash things.
• Nightmare Fuel: The final scenes in the deserted crematorium, accompanied by Don Ellis' eerily dissonant trumpet score and punctuated with Doyle's gunshots, are damn creepy.
• Rooting for the Empire: As ruthless and potentially destructive as the heroin deal is, Charnier and Weinstock's cool, collected savviness, Devereaux only being an Unwitting Pawn, and the three Bocas' close-knit relationship and blue collar dynamics cause some fans to sympathize with the drug smugglers over the abrasive cops.
• Spiritual Successor: 1973's The Seven-Ups, starring Roy Scheider as another New York City cop leading a special organized crime task force. It had the same producer and composer from The French Connection, likewise used Sonny Grosso as technical advisor, and also had a high speed car chase. The main character is an Expy of Cloudy Russo.

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